White Crow Publisher, Jonathan Beecher, invited me to write a blog on what convinced me that we were truly hearing from Stephen the Martyr, and at first I thought that the best thing I could do would be to refer once again to an issue of The Ground of Faith, where I study some dialectical Ancient Greek that Stephen had implied that he had spoken to Joseph the husband of Mary the mother of Jesus, on the occasion that Stephen, after spending a two year novitiate, was to join a group of Essenes called Nazarenes in Galilee. Other linguist experts at least ruled out fraud on the part of the medium, and that the words were genuinely from the period of time in which Stephen had lived. For me, struggling with the enormity of the proposition that we were really and truly hearing from the historical Stephen, the Greek words were decisive It had to be Stephen.

In the séances we had before us the physical presence of medium Tom Ashman, a London Jew, faulty like the rest of us, and out of his mouth came came English words allegedly spoken by Stephen. Certainly the teachings were fine, and often conflicting with the opinions of Tom Ashman when he was awake. But how much was his mind mixed up with the teachings we were hearing? I wondered whether we could talk with Stephen in another language, (which Tom didn’t understand.) When I suggested this Tom was offended, thinking I was accusing him of faking things. In spite of this, in the next session began with Greek words that even an advanced academic linguist would have struggled to construct.

But Tom never accepted the significance of the Greek, and neither did his wife Olive. Such study they maintained was valueless, and that to focus on the Greek was to focus away from the spiritual message of Stephen. Another non-linguist couple in the group were also opposed, and were sharply critical. They maintained that Tom was having us on. They never relented in their opinions. So I, in turn, felt hurt, because I was to consult many academic authorities about his words which yielded such interesting information about Stephen’s Celtic origin, and the circumstances in which he had Joined Joseph and Mary in the Nazarene sect of the Essences in Galilee. When I wrote my book about Stephen I included the results of my studies of Stephen’s Greek, defending myself against incredulous eyes of my clergy peers. Two Anglican bishops were in fact willing to support the proposition that our encounter with Stephen was real. In their book about Stephen, Tom and his wife Olive made no mention of the Greek.

The words in question were the subject of scholarly study for thirty years. The consensus was that they genuinely belonged to the early First Century CE, that they could not have been put together in modern times. They only make sense, if, as already said, Stephen had spoken them to Joseph as he joined the Essenes.

The two non-linguist couples never varied in their dismissal of the Greek, and I continue to feel hurt and baffled by it.

So we are no longer friends then? On the contrary, we have remained close friends for getting towards fifty years.

So, how am I to answer Jonathan Beecher’s question? For a while I have felt conflicted about how to answer. To make things harder I have been thinking during a period when I was celebrating my ninetieth birthday was being celebrated, when we were writing Christmas greetings and finding presents. Three Christmas parties, several Christmas services. Two friends were very sick and needed to be visited. I spent some days at the bedside of a dying friend, and of course time with this wife. We spent time with elderly friends. The Christmas period is stressful for most of us, and ours was also.

It is now the New Year, and I am recovering from the stress. Such a stressful December, and so tired I became. But do I regret the last weeks? I do not, because there was much love given and received,

Now, in the course of our conversations with Stephen, we asked him what we should call our proposed book containing his teaching. He suggested a very short title, “Us”.His answer was in line with the prayer he taught us; “Lord, let me forget that I am me: Let me know that I am with Thee; Let me not separate myself from Thee, Because I am me.”

The prime truth about us all, is that we are children of God, Who is in all, through all, and above all. Stressful Christmas is a time when we celebrate our oneness with our friends and relatives, where we cultivate every relationship we can.

For very many years, if you asked me what ultimately convinced me of the reality of Stephen, I would have referred to my studies of his Greek, but the events of the last month have led me to change my mind.
While I would still maintain that Greek can provide intellectual proof for receptive minds, the real proof is the love to which he bears witness, along with Jesus and the great mystics of all religions and all times.

As an avid afterlife researcher/Christian, I would like to add my tuppence worth to what the Rev. Michael Cocks says above, which, in his words, “convinced [him] that [he] was truly hearing from Stephen the Martyr”. For some 4 years now - since finishing a prize-winning science book validating the afterlife and immortality, I have acted as a validation researcher in this area looking for books which may justifiably be classified ‘likely accurate’ – with the dual aim to both educate myself further in this area of our possible afterlife and to pass on my findings to others.
To attain validation testing of Cock’s book, I have read it at least five times. It is not an easy read due to the archaic style of English St Stephen uses, but ironically, this itself massively assists validation since the “living” St Stephen in the time of Christ spoke no English at all, so would be expected to be completely unfamiliar with our English language. Cocks points out in his article above and elsewhere the incredible research over many years which went into determination of the language used by St Stephen - where it was eventually found by independent language experts, that the Greek language that St Stephen used via tape recording of his channelled speech spoken through the medium Tom, was an ancient form of Thracian Greek. He also occasionally spoke in Latin, a language also unknown to Tom the medium. The provenance of the book is therefore impeccable, which makes this book a standout amongst any other channelled works I have read. This is by no means the only exceptional characteristics of this book, as the content is remarkable and unparalleled by any other esoteric literature book I have ever read or heard about. This is due to a number of reasons as follows. First the book is structurally ordered, in the sense that the most important issues obviously in St Stephens mind, he deals with first. e.g. why we are here, the importance of “oneness” etc. Secondly, St Stephen continually asks his audience to ask him any question they desire, and they do over and over again. This of course would be suicidal and impossible if any fraud was involved, as the uneducated medium Tom with formerly no religious belief or education whatsoever, could not possibly cope with the random religious/biblical type interactive discussion which often followed. Finally, while St Stephen, maintained, as would be expected many religious views stated in the Bible, there were major exceptions strongly made by St Stephen, as one would expect due to likely distortions, translation errors and perhaps some deliberate falsification to the original text over thousands of years. In my view, no other known such book could possibly reach such a high validity index as this book would warrant. I therefore consider it a valuable adjunct/update to the Bible, which should be a constant companion to any conscientious churchgoers. and others, including researchers such as myself.
Should you be interested in my other research in this area or book, see my website:

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Excerpt from A Course in Miracles. IX. The “Hero” of the Dream – 74 The body is the central figure in the dreaming of the world. There is no dream without it, nor does it exist without the dream in which it acts as if it were a person, to be seen and be believed. Read here